Blog Candy & a Blog Hop

OK just goes to show I am so new at this that I cant figure out yet how to add things, pic links, or badges to my blog. So instead I have added the link here. Denise has an great giveaway going on check it out.
If any of you can send me tips on how to at badges and pic links on my sidebar I would appreciate it because I have a few I would love to have there.

http://lalasworldblog.blogspot.com/2010/11/blog-candy.html

Also DCWV is having a Blog Hop and giving away 2 stacks for CS. I love my DCWV.

http://dcwvinc.blogspot.com/

DCWV are at it again

DCWV are giving away 2 CS stacks so check out their blog here
http://dcwvinc.blogspot.com/2010/11/sizzix-triple-play-blog-hop-week-2.html

Advent Calendar

 So this past Saturday I went to a Super Saturday crafting event with the women from my church. We do these at least once a year. They have several projects for us to do and we order the supplies about 2 weeks in advance. I really wanted to do this project as I have no Advent Calendar in my home. We had the choice of the saying "Tis the season for CHRIST" or "Tis the season for FAMILY". I want to do Christ as that is what I try to teach my children Christmas is all about. I wanted to use my own CS as I have a ton of it and I did not want to do the traditional colours. I love snowflakes and I did not want to see Christmas designs on my board. I wanted it to be all about Christ.The CS I used of course is from DCWV. The Blue you see here is a shimmery blue and was from last years Holiday Collection The Christmas Cardstock stack. I do believe the Snowflake CS is from last years BoBunny Christmas collection.  I first painted the board a cream colour, this took several coats.While that was drying I cut the CS in to 6x12 strips and used my Martha Steward boarder and Corner punch, wish I had the snowflake set. Once dry I Mod Poded the CS to the board. Setting that aside to dry. Once dry I added the rhinestone snowflake and the little snowflake glitter stickers to the bottom corners of the large frame and the one that says CHRIST on it.

Here you can see the squares and the side that has on it the CS. Again the CS used is DCWV, the snowflake pieces are from last years The Christmas Stack and the stripes are from this years The Winter Stack, that is also were I got the CS for under the word CHRIST. Of course all this CS has glitter in it, got to have my glitter. For these squares the CS got cut in 3" by 3" squares and then Mod Podded onto the wood. Again set aside to dry. Let me tell you it takes forever for Mod Pod to dry.  After they dried the letters were added on. All the lettering and numbers are vinyl and Mod Podded over top to seal it all together.

My church makes these little cards with pictures of Christ on them so I picked up about 3 different sets. I also use some pictures of little children from a pack call "I am a Child of God". So about every third picture is of a child, some with a mom others of children sharing or praying. Because I was making this with my young children in mind I thought it was perfect to use these pictures. Again the pictures were trimmed to 3x3 squares and then Mod Podded on. I love the way it turned out and will now just have to get out my stand to display it. I plan on making 2 more of these next year but saying "Tis the season for FAMILY" and using pictures of all the grand kids to give to the grandparents. I think they will love it.

a Thanful Blog Hop

Today pinkcricut and pinky and others are having a wonderful blog hop. At each stop they have a prize they are giving away. Come and join the fun and check out some amazing projects.

http://www.pinkcricut.com/2010/11/thankful-blog-hop/

Blog hop & Give away

Well my favourite company is at it again but this time they are teamed up with sizzix. They are having a Blog Hop and giving away some amazing Prizes. Check it out!!

http://dcwvinc.blogspot.com/2010/11/sizzix-triple-play-blog-hop-week-1.html

So sad

Went to my favourite and only scrapbook store here to get the Cottage Christmas pp from imaginisce and to see if they have the Enchanted collection coming in.Well they only had 2 pp left of the Cottage Christmas so picked that up with the matching ribbon will make cards out of that. They are not getting the Enchanted collection in which I wanted to make a LO so I instead chose the Dino Roar pp, ribbon and 3D stickers for a LO. I need these pps and collection by imaginisce so that I might send pics of these projects to them to apply for their 2011 design team. Now after talking with the manager of the store I want to be on the DT more then ever because then I will get to play with imaginisce new products and not wait around to see if my store here will get them. I REALLY wanted the Enchanted collection because of the fact I have 2 young girls and those pps would make some wonderful LOs for them. Well I guess they will have to go onto my wish list and if I am lucky I will have a secret pal that will buy them for me.

On another note. I picked up some more i-Rock rhinestones but while at Michaels I also checked out their jewelry section. They have some Heat Set Crystals there. I picked up 2 different brands to see if they will work with the i-Rock. I will post later if they work and what those brands are. There was all kinds of different colours but was unable to see if there was other heat set products. Had my 2 little girls with me and Cara, the youngest, did not want to be there so it became a look, grab, buy type of stop. Well it is time to go and nurse Cara and get her to sleep so I can try and get some crafting done. I will post some pics later.

Punches

So on the weekend I bought my first set of corner and boarder punches by Martha Stewart. Michael's was having a sale and selling all their Halloween products at 50% off, well a sales associate got a little happy with the signs and placed on on the end of the display where there were all these punches. I picked up a set, for me, along with the Heat Gun, again with 50% off, to send to a pal. I have some punches, corner punches and little character punches but I don't really have any boarder ones and my pages and cards really are lacking because of this. I figure this was a great way to try these out because they are normally $35 here. I paid $17 for the set and now that I have tried them would gladly pay full price for more. I will be on the look out from now on for these sets to actually go on sale and plan on taking full advantage when that happens. I love finding a new product that I enjoy and that I can share how fantastic it is.

I also commented that I would share what I thought of the i-Rock. This is a must have tool, I need to get more of the gems for it and I am going to try some of the other brands of heat gems out there to see how well it works with them. Now all I have to do is track down the video I saw on YouTube that demonstrated how to make your own stencils. I have a ton of little Cross Stitch designs that I could easily convert over to use the i-Rock with on my cards and lay outs. Get one of these wonderful little tools you will not be disappointed!

Should I or shouldn't I

Imaginisce is having a Design Team Call and so is Scrap, Laugh, Love. OK so I am thinking I might want to try for both of theses. Crazy I know because the designers on both of these sites are incredible. I look around at my scrap room and the projects I have done or the ones done for me and think I am no were near as creative as most of the women out there. But then I sit and remember that my dream job would be working for any one of my favourite craft sites and this is my chance. Being a stay at home mom life can be somewhat uneventful. Now with the kids there is always something going on but myself, nothing. Crafting weather that is scrap booking, card making, altering or my stress relief, cross stitching is my joy. This is my chance to do something for me, something I love and can be proud of. I would love to be involved with a Design Team and will be working on my applications over the next couple of weeks. I will look at it like all things in life. It is a learning experience regardless of the out come. Hopefully they will give some feed back to applicants and I can improve on what I am doing for the next time I try. Not to try is failure, success only comes to those willing to try and grab it. So I guess that answers that question for me. This also means I will have to spend sometime and figure out how to place Tags/Badges from other sites on to my blog so that people can just click on them to get to those sites. Time to go shopping for some Imaginisce supplies and create some projects to submit and see what happens LOL :D